LIFE Mires Estonia — National Peatland Rewetting Programme

Estonia's ancient raised bogs store vast amounts of carbon, but decades of drainage for forestry and agriculture left many mires degraded. Degraded Estonian peatland is estimated to emit around 8 million tonnes of CO2 a year — roughly a third of the country's total emissions, more than its cars and trucks combined.

LIFE Mires Estonia (LIFE14 NAT/EE/000126) ran from September 2015 to December 2021, led by the Estonian Fund for Nature (ELF) with the University of Tartu. The project restored natural hydrology at mires including Feodorisoo, Laukasoo, Ohepalu, Sirtsi, Soosaare and Tudusoo, closing 317 km of drainage ditches, building roughly 2,500 dams and moving about 300,000 m3 of soil, including 163 ha of former peat-mining land.

The European Commission's official project database confirms 7,900 ha of mire had natural water conditions restored, exceeding the original 5,800 ha target. Monitoring recorded the return of willow grouse, western capercaillie, moor frog and dragonfly populations across six Natura 2000 sites, and a public LIFE Trail at Tudusoo drew over 6,000 visitors after opening in April 2020.

Early press coverage published while the project was under way cited different provisional figures (around 50,000 acres and a EUR 2 million budget); this entry uses the European Commission's official close-out figures as the authoritative source. The project's climate benefit is counted through Estonia's national greenhouse-gas inventory (LULUCF) rather than a separate voluntary carbon-credit market.